I set up a prayer room at my church library, open from 6:00 am to 6:00 pm, where people could come a quiietly pray at their convenience. I encouraged people to sign up ahead of time, but also accepted people's commitments to pray at their homes or places of work. I even directed people to the webcast and the conference phone call. I think there were about 10 to 15 people who were from Central who actually came to the prayer room at different times during the day to pray, and a few non-members who came in from other churches ( 4 that I'm aware of). 20 to 30 people made a commitment to pray at home or at other venues. This was a better response than last year, and I now have a couple of ideas how to improve the outreach.

Our Community had two prayer events. We had a Wednesday night event for those unable to attend our Thursday event. Our Wednesday night was at 6:30 P.M. Our Thursday event was from 12:00 noon until 12:50 with a meal served. This was so people could come during the lunch hour and particpate. I believe that both were probably attended by different faiths, although I did not attend the Wednesday evening service. The Thursday meal followed the National Day Of Prayer Guide in praying for the different areas in need of prayer. Government, Church, Military, Family, Education, Media, Business. A prayer leader lead prayer for each area followed by a moment of silent prayer that everyone could partipate in.

We devoted our Wednesday night service to prayer for the nation. Praise and worship focused on repentance, revival, and national prayer themes, followed by a general opening prayer and a congregational prayer reading of the 2012 National Prayer, followed by different individuals (ages 23-60) praying their asigned topic of the seven topics given by the NDP task force. That was followed by communion. The service ended with each person joining with one other person to pray for each other and any personal needs or concerns, followed by dismissal. Members were encouraged to take the NDP prayer guides home with them for prayer on the following day, which was the actual Thursday observance of NDP.

This year we invite two other churches to join up for National Day of Prayer. What we do is we open the church doors up at 8 am ( last year 7 am ) and invite others to come into pray all day. We provide prayer guides for them to pray on the 7 focuses of National Prayer Day government, media, family, church, armed forces, education, marketplace and also repent.

I ask for one person to commit to praying for a whole hour at 8 and then at 9 etc unti 5 pm. I assign them a specific focus to pray on from the 7 prayer focuses. However I expect them to lead others who come during that hour on that prayer focus at least for 15 minutes or so. However , the persons who attend are free to pray on any of the other focuses , to walk and pray , to be silent. We create mini prayer stations for each of the prayer focuses. We encourage them to sit at a prayer station and just pray on that focus and to write a prayer. During the evening about 30 came at 6:30pm for our prayer meeting and we asked for volunteers to pray on the various prayer focueses

Not many attended as we wished but I did have a person committed to each hour from 8 to 5. Maybe 5 or 7 was the highest number that signed in during that hour.

Nice. idea. We pray that others will see the value in attending group prayer.

Kathleen Marshall said:

I set up a prayer room at my church library, open from 6:00 am to 6:00 pm, where people could come a quiietly pray at their convenience. I encouraged people to sign up ahead of time, but also accepted people's commitments to pray at their homes or places of work. I even directed people to the webcast and the conference phone call. I think there were about 10 to 15 people who were from Central who actually came to the prayer room at different times during the day to pray, and a few non-members who came in from other churches ( 4 that I'm aware of). 20 to 30 people made a commitment to pray at home or at other venues. This was a better response than last year, and I now have a couple of ideas how to improve the outreach.

Mission Birmingham helps plan and host the Greater Birmingham Mayors' Prayer Breakfast. It includes the mayors from the metro-Birmingham area and many pastors and ministry leaders, as well as local business leaders, intercessors and such. We enjoy a meal together, a special guest speaker, and a time of prayer for our national and local government, among other things. This event has been happening annually for 50 years. It's incredible and amazing to be a part of it.

We are again doing a social media day of prayer where we send out a prayer email, text or Facebook update every half hour with a specific praise or request. This way we can have people praying no matter where they are and we do not all have to meet in the same place.

This Thursday, May 7th, is the National Day of Prayer in the U.S. We hope you will find times and places to gather with other believers to pray for the church in America, our families and our national, state and local leaders.

WE ALSO HOPE YOU WILL SEE A SUSTAINED PASSION IN PRAYER DEVELOP IN YOUR CHURCH BEYOND THE NATIONAL DAY OF PRAYER. That is why we are "pulling out all the stops" to help equip you and your church toward a growing and sustained movement of worship-based prayer.

We hope you will take advantage of our FRESH ENCOUNTERS "fire sale" bundle! This month only we are doing all we can to get this valuable resource into your hands to help you "experience transformation through united worship-based prayer." The bundle includes the six-session audio CD of the complete Fresh Encounters seminar,

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